entrancelogs | {You don't have to try so hard to hurt me

Entry tags:

{You don't have to try so hard to hurt me

Who: Cisco + Various; m!Cisco + Various
Where: Physics Lab floor 4/room 052; various
When: Now
Rating: PG-13ish {language, ~~possible vague hints at~~ dark themes, hints/various degrees of humiliation/dehumanization/treating a person as a literal pet, drugs, various shades of violence, pushy sexual advances}
Summary: Science + metahuman powers = ?????? ; AKA: Fitz and Cisco try to break a hole through Wonderland's barriers in their attempts to reach another dimension, but the experiment has gone sideways! Mirror Cisco is on the loose in the mansion and he's determined to wreck his Real's life in the most disastrous ways possible and will be trying to fool people when and where he can. WHO will discover this slippery switch?! How much chaos will M!Cisco leave behind?!
The Story: Headers in comments, links to specific things

♥ The Beginning
If you have any need for pre-science stuff, hit me here!

♣ Honey, I think we science'd too hard [Fitz, Mason twins]
Fitz and Cisco prep for their testing and are interrupted by those meddling Mason twins!

♥ Real!Cisco in Mirror!Wonderland
What it says on the tin. If you have a mirror that's involved in the plans with him mirror side, this is where it'll go down. If you want something with your mirror and him, hmu here or on plurk @ loyalwolf to discuss logistics because things are pretty set here, for pre-planned things!

♣ Sometimes, even God doesn't know where the dice will land [m!Fitz, m!Cait]
Real!Cisco lands mirror side and is greeted by mirror!Fitz, who will take him to mirror!Caitlin. And then the real fun can begin. ;) cw: hints of humiliation/dehumanization/treating a person as a literal pet, violence
♣ And on the fourth day, master makes the puppy beg [m!Fitz]
A little training sesh with Cisco and m!Fitz. Good pets get treats. cw: humiliation/dehumanization/treating a person as a literal pet, violence
♣ Friend or Foe, is there even a difference anymore? [m!Barry/Savitar]
Cisco gets a visit by ~~a transformer~~ Savitar.

♠ Mirror!Cisco in Real!Wonderland
For all your mirror!Cisco needs! I'll be posting things throughout the day as I get starters written.

♣ I feel like I'm diagonally parked in a parallel universe [Fitz]
Mirror!Cisco arrives in Real!Wonderland, landing in the Physics Lab with Fitz and feigns a lot of confusion/frustration.
♣ Network Post [OTA]
m!Cisco "apologizes" for any disturbances and lets Wonderland at large know that their tests "failed".
♣ All the signs disagree because it's the nature of opposites [Caitin Snow]
Mirror!Cisco decides to pay Caitlin a visit. It doesn't go as he planned and she lands herself in some pretty big trouble. cw: violence
♣ Cause I'm livin' that free life [OTA]
m!Cisco is enjoying his new-found freedom. Please feel free to find him anywhere, including places not listed in the options! cw: various shades of violence
♦ She's just not that into you [Daisy Johnson]
Daisy has a run-in with Cisco-- or is it? She's pretty sure her friend isn't this much of a fuckboy, but he sure is acting weird. cw: pushy sexual advances
♦ How about we cut a deal? [Eobard Thawne]
m!Cisco runs into Eobard Thawne and just can't quite contain his pride. Oops? At least the speedster lets him keep his secret and have his fun~ cw: light violence
♦ Honey, are you okay, you seem a little scattered [Jesse Wells]
Jesse is pretty well convinced that the science has scrambled Cisco a bit.
♦ Can't catch me, if you get too close, I'm gone like a cool breeze [m!Mae, m!Napstablook]
Mirrors Mae and Napstablook try to apprehend m!Cisco.... and unfortunately fail at their task. cw: violence
♦ And I would have gotten away with it too, if it wasn't for those Nosy News Twins [Georgia Mason, Shaun Mason]
Georgia and Shaun catch up with m!Cisco and reveal The Truth.
♦ You tried and you tried, and still you got caught [Jesse Wells]
Jesse has had her suspicions confirmed-- double confirmed, even, now that she's caught m!Cisco in her lab, trying to tamper with Cisco's gadgets!
♦ Thread title [Jane Foster]
Jane has a rather unfortunate predisposition and she's helping m!Cisco hide out.
♦ Game Over [m!Kay]
Well, the jig is up! m!Cisco has been apprehended, it's time to go home and face the consequences of what he's done.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Final checks and balances are happening and the lab is alive with energy. The scene set before anyone that may be present makes it obvious they're getting amped up and ready to go ahead with their plans. Buzzes, beeps and whirs of machinces, muttered comments by the present scientists as they check things off. There isn't much left to do and no time left to waste.

With all of the edits and tweaks finalized--including the notes Cisco had gotten from his mirror friend, which he'd told no one about--they're set up to do their big rounds of testing today. Despite the fact that it feels like he's done this a thousand times, Cisco has a good feeling about this. Things have been building all week and it's almost like he can feel it in his bones-- it's going to work. He just has to have enough faith in himself, in his abilities, in everything they've worked on. Because that's absolutely how this worked, faith, trust and pixie-- wait.

"Ready?" He asks, casting a glance at his partner-in-science, waiting for the signal for the go-ahead to try this again.

Said partner-in-science is bent over the desk, staring at a series of monitors stacked together, each determining a different set of data. It's tense and dangerous. He expects it to fail. The difficulty is making sure that it fails safely.

"Think smallscale. We just want to make sure it works, and reach a failure point if it doesn't. If you feel faint, stop. All right?"

But he'll give the signal nonetheless, finally powering on the towering doorway beside them.

Cisco isn't expecting a lot himself. Every other attempt he's made has gone to zilch, nada, nothing. But he doesn't just want this to work, he needs it to. He has to save Caitlin before he can even pretend he can do anything else. And that, more than anything else, is really where his mind is focused.

He nods a little and turns away from his friend, his minding wandering for the shortest moment in a note to self to remember to give Maya the sonar gun he'd finally finished for her. Casting the thought aside, he lifts his hand and channels the energy he can literally feel both in the air and within himself. He focuses on pushing that energy out, and creating a portal, filling the lab with a soft blue glow that's become a weirdly familiar staple in the room over recent weeks. He directs that energy at the doorway, meant to amplify and stabilize his powers.

The portal is held, just inside the doorway, blue and white light almost rippling in what had been an empty space. It's containing it, like they'd wanted, and Cisco has to take a moment to admire the fact that this much has worked already. "Whoa...this is mad freaky, dude."

"Well. This certainly looks like nothing remotely of interest to my readers." Surprise, there's a blogger in the room, raising an eyebrow over her sunglasses and holding an MP3 recorder in her hands. She loves her MP3 recorder. It gets great quality sound when she does interviews, and it makes people assume that's the only recording device she has. It's not, of course. She's wired up with more cameras and hidden mikes that she can count thanks to Buffy. But people always assume that if they can see a recording device, that's the one to worry about.

She smirks. "What was it you called it? A mechanical stress test? Cause it sure looks like you're making some kind of portal. But you're the scientists. You tell me."

Shaun's standing over George's shoulder with a handheld camera which--as with George--is only one of many recording devices he has all over his person. He's a little sorry that Cisco is here, because he likes him, and he knows he's going to be annoying. Maybe he can make it up to him by sharing some terrible jokes later. For now, he glances at the other guy in the room.

"Yeah, if you'd said portals, I would totally have understood what you were talking about. I played... at least five minutes of that game."

Fitz tries quite hard not to roll his eyes at Cisco. But even now, after working on a project of this size, it's difficult to understand how a man that gifted in engineering can also be that colloquial. Fitz is sure that it'll be absolutely endearing in time, but now is not yet that time. He opens his mouth to reply, and then...

That. An overexcited reporter seeking nonexistent controversy. This is exactly what he'd been hoping for. Joy.

"It's a stress test for a mechanism that may provide answers in the distant future." He sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose. Now? Is now really the time for this?? "Right now, it's just parts that are months away from showing genuine promise. There's no sense in getting anyone worked up over any of it."

He thinks of Cisco, and how shy he can be about his powers. It isn't fair to see someone so eager about potentially outing his identity as a powered person.

Cisco spins in a slow circle toward the new voices in the room. Familiar voices, even. Today is shaping up to be great already. Despite the instant minor swell of panic, he looks far more collected on the outside than he would have ever given himself credit to be able to pull off.

"Don't you have to have consent to record people?" His words are a little snippy and he's really not sorry, even if he does, usually, kind of like both of the Mason siblings. Right now, their curiosities mean less than this project. Far less.

"You also have to get a whole lot of permits and approvals before you can run an experiment on this scale, but I won't tell if you won't. Besides, Fitz invited us." Sort of. Georgia shrugs. Recording people in public is perfectly legal, and while it's questionable how public this is, it's also... not like they have any kind of legal system. What's legal for one world or country might be illegal in another. It's not something anyone could prosecute, even if they felt the need.

"No one's getting worked up but the two of you. We're just looking for the facts that you've attempted to conceal at every turn. Now, what exactly is this mechanism?" She looks at Cisco. "That energy. How long have you been able to do that?"

Shaun, meanwhile, grins and gives Cisco a little wave. "Hey, man. Didn't know you were going to be here." He nods toward the portal-looking thing. "So... Thinking with portals, huh? You play that game, too?"

Cisco looks uncomfortable, and that's confirmation for For that This Is Wrong. His brow furrows, eyes darkening.

"You don't get to do that to him. He'll come forward when he's ready or not at all. You don't have the right to do any of what you're doing."

"Right." He mumbles at the counter-argument about legalities. There really isn't much of a justice system in Wonderland, she has a point. Dammit. Cisco's brows arch when George says Fitz invited them. That seems...questionable. Fitz isn't huge on outsiders in the lab and it wouldn't make sense for him to want people around for all of this, either. Especially since they don't really know what's going to happen. For all they know, it'll backfire and explode in their faces. Literally. Who knows. Wonderland is hardly the most predictable place. "Gee, you'd think having people barge in on us unannounced is unsettling or something." He half-heartedly rolls his eyes.

"Hey." Cisco lifts a hand in an awkward wave at Shaun. "Actually, yeah, I have, but-- that's...not..." He motions vaguely over his shoulder at the doorway behind him and shakes his head.

He doesn't even realize that anything he's done or said or how he's been acting has anything to do with Fitz's defense. Clueless boy is clueless okay.

Georgia glances from Fitz to Cisco, then rolls her eyes, letting the motion carry her entire head so that it's obvious, even with the sunglasses. "Fucking superheroes. I'm not going to run an article exposing that you're the Fantastic Portal Man or whatever. Even if I didn't care about it being a dick move, it's a boring story." It's Wonderland. Superpowers are not that new.

She rounds back on Fitz, voice hardening. "I'm a hell of a lot more interested in what you're doing. You want to talk about rights? Who gave you the right to rip a hole in the walls of reality and act like I'm unreasonable for being concerned. Where does the portal go, Dr. Fitz?"

"Well, I figured, since I see the blue one, but not the orange one." He's going to let George handle going on the attack. She does hard-hitting journalist better than he ever will, and he's happier not to have to step up to the plate.

[Benefits of having a sister who lives outside your head?]

He laughs quietly. "Well, it's nice to not have to do all the talking."

[Don't mind Shaun. He talks to the voices in his head.]

"Given that we've used some theories based on the previous event's tears, I believe it's Wonderland itself that provided the data. But it's unfinished. Right now, the portal most likely doesn't lead anywhere. At this stage, we only want it to turn on without exploding."

And there's no reason to explain this to anyone. He'd be kicking her out of the lab already, if he thought she'd actually leave if he told her to go.

"A-actually, I have a--" He holds up a finger to correct her because, hey, he already has a code name, but he stops himself and drops his hand back down to his side. "Nevermind." he mutters quickly, deciding this is an unimportant line of conversation at the current time.

He doesn't actively comment on it, but have a very expressive, confused look thrown in your direction, Shaun.

He turns back to George, hands moving animatedly as he talks. "Look, if this turns out to be anything even halfway decently useful, we can explain what we're doing with all the dirty details. Hell, we could write a dissertation on it, but none of it matters if it doesn't work." She really, really does not understand the gravity of this situation right now. Actually, none of them do, and it's all he can do to not completely loose it right now.

He isn't really sure how much of it Fitz wants to share with anyone, so he's keeping his own comments about it all vague enough to not matter in the grand scheme.

She watches them, expression as impassive as ever as she considers their words. She ignores Shaun talking to the voice in his head. It hurts her heart, but this is hardly the time or place for it.

"For future notice, if you'd just told me that to begin with, we could have avoided this whole mess." She always gets her story. Or she dies trying.

"Though I would be very interested in seeing some explosions," Shaun points out. "But I can wait for the kind that are intentional." He pauses in consideration. "Or make my own. With glitter."

"And I'll not be held accountable to a pair of intruders with an overinflated sense of self-importance."

That remark is in a smaller voice, though. He's already physically shrinking down, head lowering as his shoulders tense.

"To be fair, I didn't even know you were talking to him before. I didn't exactly stalk the post he made because I didn't think it was a big deal to give a headsup that things might get loud." He didn't really see the risk she's apparently seeing with all of this. Granted, that's probably because he has the information she's missing like how his own portals work and how Wonderland's made them fail, but he can't even be bothered to give a damn at the moment. Sorry, George. His best friend's safety is more important than you getting your story.

"We may not be giving weekly reports on what we're doing here, but I don't think anyone's been that in the dark that some of us have been working on trying to find a way home. There's no sense in getting people's hopes up over something that is almost certainly destined to fail the first few, probably hundred times." At least. Because that's how experiments go. Trial and error, over and over again, until even the slightest change in found in the results.

Cisco is frustrated-- with the line of questioning, with being bombarded in the lab in the first place, but more than anything else with the time being wasted. "Is there anything else? Because we do kind of have things to tend to this morning."

Ah, self-importance. Usually people who call her that have something to hide. She smiles. It's not a nice expression.

"We're the free fucking press. We hold everyone accountable." To say you're above that is to admit you have ego enough to think your judgment is infallible. Which is to say, she's not remotely surprised Fitz is in that camp.

"We're done here. For now, anyway." But she'll be paying attention. She glances over at Shaun. "Come on." She shoots them one last disdainful look then turns, stalking away.

Fitz watches the twins leave, but doesn't remark on it. He falls thoroughly silent, and then moves away from the portal. They almost lost everything, and for what? For some reporters?? Because they've come around chasing windmills?? It's the worst thing. It's left him anxious and angry and without a release valve.

He pushes over a tray of empty beakers, as if the shattering glass will somehow soothe the wrinkle in the day's schedule.

Cisco huffs a sigh as they leave and shakes his head, clearly annoyed in his own right by the whole ordeal. He doesn't really have time to have much more of a reaction, though, because suddenly glass is being shattered. His head snaps toward the direction of the sound and...otherwise, he seems pretty unphased by it. Mostly it just reminds him he misses Harry. That asshole was always throwing things when he was mad. Which was, incidentally, always. So.

"Better?" He asks, a lilt to his voice though it's not exactly amused, knowing full well the answer is a resounding "NO". "They're curious kids with nothing else better to do than stick their noses into other people's business. We'll deal with it later." He waves a hand dismissively, "We have more important things to do today."

Of course it isn't better. It's abjectly horrible and nothing can change that. But Cisco's lack of response is close to Jemma's. It's a raised eyebrow and half-remark and provides enough of a grounding element for him to pull back.

"Think they're the bloody director of this place..." It's a half-formed utterance as he returns to his initial position. He ought to be refocusing.

"Lying in wait for us, as if this is a game...!"

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

{You don't have to try so hard to hurt me

{Honey, I think we science'd too hard | Physics Lab

{Honey, I think we science'd too hard

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